1300 improver repertoar: Catalan, French, QGD/KID?

Hi all!

Background: I've recently joined a local club and just started to "learn" chess. Initially, I played London, French, and just making up my own QGD against d4. Now I would like a more solid repertoar to be able to study it a bit, and become a more solid player. I don't want to play the London any more, and have thought about the QG and Catalan, and since when I play the QG I fall into playing it as a London many times, I've decided to go with the Catalan to learn something new. I will stick with the French as I find it quite nice, and I bought Neil McDonald's book on it. However, against d4, I have not decided if QGD is right or if I should go with something like KID.

Question: Does these openings go well together? What to you think of the repertoar: Catalan, French, and QGD? And Catalan, French, KID? Is it better to change QGD to KID as it is "more like" the french? And do you have any good resources that you recommend for any of these openings?

Thank you!

Haha thank you for the straightforward advice I appreciate it! So then I can stick to:

White: QG, Against e4: French, and Against d4: QGD.

Do you have any recommendations for books to understand the idea of QG, or would you recommend just general chess books instead? E.g., there is a book by Neil McDonald named "The Queen's Gambit Declined".

The French and KID go very well together as they both often, though not always, lead to a blocked center. I have often advertised the two going hand-in-hand. Wolfgang Uhlmann and Igor Glek had such repertoire as Black.

The Catalan alone is insufficient. The Catalan only works when Black has blocked his light-squared Bishop. 1.d4 Nf6 2.c4 e6 3.g3 or 1.d4 d5 2.c4 e6 3.Nf3 Nf6 4.g3. In the latter case, Nf3 needs to be played first to avoid ...f5. After 3...f5?, you will not fianchetto. The Bishops will go to f4 and d3. Black has a bad position. Commit to 3.g3 and 3...f5 is fine.

But if Black's Bishop is not blocked by ...e6, you need something else. Catalan doesn't work. You need a line against each of the following:

Slav

QGA

Old Benoni (1...c5)

Modern Benoni

Benko Gambit

Dutch

Kings Indian

Grunfeld

Thank you for the reply! I actually heard that the French and KID goes well together from your previous posts, and decided to look into the structure a bit more from that!

> The Catalan alone is insufficient.

Ah okay, I did not realize that. Then maybe it's better to just stick to QG for a while, and really try to understand that opening. For instance, I found this book Complete-Guide-Queens-Gambit-Play which might help me for both White and Black then. Do you think QG/French/QGD is a good chess improver repertoire? Thanks!

It depends on your style.

QGD is very solid and equalising.

It's also not one defence. There are several types of QGD like the Tartakower, Lasker, Ragozin, Tarrasch and Orthodox. They each have different characters.

KID is very double edged and risky. Black gives up the centre to expand aggressively on the kingside. It doesn't want to accept equality. It wants to be better or worse. It's also very flexible so can be adapted to the variation such as transposing to Benoni structures.

Queen's Gambit and Catalan are both good. Queen's Gambit you generally win back the pawn if black takes and try to play for e4.

The Catalan is a true gambit as the bishop is removed from the diagonal to recapture the pawn. White hopes to prove compensation with pressure against the queenside or hopefully win back the pawn in some way later.

Queen's Gambit is probably more solid for this reason.

As mentioned, Catalan alone isn't enough. You can't force transposing into it. It's the opponents choice to play into the Catalan.

Against KID, Grünfeld and Benoni, it's possible to play fianchetto setups. These can be quite annoying for the opponent as they are more quiet games. Trompowsky is an annoying opening for the opponent but let's just say there are not many fireworks.

You might like something more ambitious

• Against the KID, the Bayonet Attack, Sämisch, Averbakh or Four Pawns Attack.
• Against the Grünfeld, the Russian, Exchange or Petrosian.
• Against the Benoni, the Taimanov or Classical.

These are just some examples.

Very interesting, thank you for the reply! I think I'll for now stick to the QGD response for d4, as KID seems more complicated. Do you have any recommendations for books in this area?

If you want to study the Queen's Gambit, I've made a study based on Lars Schandorff's book not to mention that I also linked the Indian Defenses in the study which most of my d4 repertoire is based on his two books. Catalan is not a bad opening but you do need to learn how to play with compensation which can be tricky. You might also like my French study if you want to delve deeper into it but recently, I've been trying out 1.e4 e5 which has been very good so far, and would highly recommend it if you want to try something new. They recommend good systems and show good master games on how to deal with them.

Studying openings is bad at your level only if you are going through all these variations you will never touch instead of understanding them. I'd argue that is a lot better to study openings and look at the middlegames that arise from the opening you are studying. I find this more helpful as I like to know what to do after the opening phase. I would also recommend you check out Every Pawn Structure Explained by Johan Hellsten because he gives very explanations for the plans for the pawn structures like in the Queen's Gambit, for example, Carlsbad, Isolated d-pawn, Semi-Tarrasch, etc. This will help you gain an advantage over your opponents who don't have a middlegame plan and help you counter theirs

I don't know any books. I've just watched youtube videos. Hanging Pawns has some good videos covering various openings so that may be helpful to you.

KID is just very sharp and aggressive. The idea is to mate the white king as soon as possible, at least in the Classical lines.

It's possible to score quick victories if opponent can't handle the defence and counterattack. The difference is that white is attacking on the queenside while black is attacking on the kingside and playing for mate.

Many players enjoy these positions with both colours.

Why do you have to be like this?

Awesome, thank you for sharing the study!

Yes I agree with your views on studying the opening, I realize that I should not study a lot of very specific lines etc, since the opportunity cost is too high. I will definitely look into the pawn structures that you linked, thank you!

Cool, I will check it out, thank you!

I see, yeah I just want something solid, so I know what strategy I should start with against d4. I think I will stick with various lines of QGD for now.

However, I think I would enjoy an "overview book" of different chess openings, not 20 lines deep, but just an overview, to get a better understanding of the different ideas in the opening to attack the center, counter attack, develop etc.

Ah okay, I understand what you mean, I'll start there! Thanks!

If you actually want to play the Catalan, the Pseudo-Catalan (1. d4 Nf6/d5 2. Nf3 d5/Nf6 3. g3) is probably the simplest and easiest way to do it. You avoid an early c4, so Black can't play for almost any of the options listed above. Pseudo-Catalan often transposes to either the Open or Closed Catalan, but considering you're 1300 and your opponents are 1300, I doubt they'll know Catalan theory, even in a classical format.

It's even the recommendation in Keep It Simple 1.d4. Even I struggle against it at my level

For the QGD you can look in to Marovic's book, or Saddler's book or Kasparov's Chessbase DVD, either of these is a very good introduction.

I'd say the French and KID share the similarities ThrillerFan mentioned but of course the pawn structures are very different.

The French (oddly) does have a little overlap with the QGD, as in the QGD you can get a reverse French advance structure after an ..Ne4 NxN dxe4. But it's not as large an overlap to trigger broad repertoire choices.

I prefer the QGD, which I play now, over the KID, which I played decades ago, because it's less theoretical and more of a let's play a classical opening and then let's play chess type of game. You need to pick a line to start with though, maybe start with the orthodox and then you see if e.g. you want to add something more dynamic like the Tartakower. The Tarrasch is also fine and better than it's reputation.

That's very interesting, I did not know about that one! Thank you!